Dazzled
by Cheloya
Summary: OLD. The Question. Vague D x Leon.


Disclaimer: Don't own D, don't own Leon, don't own bad memory-loss cliches.

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**Dazzled**

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"There is one thing I've been meaning to ask you."

He said the words slowly and deliberately, knowing he couldn't take them back, knowing that he'd either have to ask the Count his question or do some pretty damn quick thinking to come up with something he hadn't been meaning to ask, but would sound like he had.

D turned from the dolphins swimming alongside the boat. "Anything!" His eyes still glimmered with pleasure, presumably due to the presence of the dolphins. Leon wasn't too fussed with the creatures, probably because he'd seen one too many showings of _Flipper_ in his time. It was nice to see the Count happy, though, even if it wasn't directed at him.

That was sort of what he'd been meaning to ask about.

And now that he was facing the Detective, a hint of smugness twisted his lips. The indefinable aura of mystery was back, cloaking any honest emotion D might have felt. Leon hated that. More than anything, he hated it when people weren't honest with each other.

Leon was usually _too_ honest, but he made up for it with periods of fierce reticence. Most of those occurred around Count D, these days. Count D or Jill, anyway.

"Of course, you do realise that no matter what I tell you, we'll have forgotten it by the time we get back home."

Leon stared at D, the lighter he'd been flicking for the last few minutes finally catching the spark. He barely noticed.

"Say what?"

D leaned back against the guard rail, an inscrutable expression upon his face. "I did tell you, Detective. In order to leave the island, we will lose our memories of this place, and everything that happened here. Liberating, is it not? Please, ask away."

Leon continued to stare at D until the lighter began to burn his fingers. He hissed and dropped it, stuffing his salty, sand-covered fingers into his mouth with a grimace. The lighter skittered across the deck and dropped neatly over the edge into the ocean. D made a sound of dismay, turning back to the dolphins.

Leon tried not to notice when one of the grey mammals collected the lighter from a premature grave in the watery depths and placed it painstakingly in the palm of D's hand. Then, with sudden (and surprising, given the week he'd had) clarity, he realised that D was absolutely right. No memories, if you believed in that shit - which, after the week he'd had, Leon had to admit he sort of did - was pretty much as liberated as you got.

What was the saying from that kids movie Chris loved so much? _Hakuna matata?_

"We're not going to remember anything...?" D ignored this, seeming to sense that it was merely musing aloud rather than a real question. Still, he strode back across the deck and handed the lighter back to Leon. Absently, Leon grabbed it and stuffed it in the pocket of his board shorts. "We're not going to remember anything."

D raised one thin eyebrow, managing to look at once superior and amused. "I believe we had established that, Detective."

What the hell. _Hakuna matata._

"All right, fine." Leon leaned back against the bulkhead, frowning. "Here's what I wanted to say. And I'd really appreciate it if you didn't, I don't know, laugh at me for this."

D's smug expression paused and took on a slightly more intrigued cast. "I will try my very hardest, Detective."

There was a pause.

"Smile."

D frowned. "I beg your pardon?"

"Just... hell, I don't know, all right? That first day with the, the mermaid, you - she - you were wandering around and you'd just bashed into a damn glass door but you were looking up at the sun and, and you _smiled,_ really _smiled_..." Leon trailed off halfway through his blustering, less angered, more morose.

"It just... I mean, it occurred to me that you never actually do. Smile, I mean. Not really."

D looked slightly surprised. "Whatever do you mean, Detective?"

Leon crossed his arms, then uncrossed them fitfully, and then grit his teeth in annoyance.

"Look, I just want to know why the hell you never smile like that in real life, like you're really happy. _Aren't_ you happy? Or is it just because of me?"

The Chinese man's face had fallen just a little, his eyes dulling. He clasped his hands in his lap, staring at the Detective, worrying at the flesh of his lip with his front teeth. In a voice barely stronger than a murmur, he said, "Why would you think that, Detective?"

Leon shrugged uncomfortably. "I don't know. I mean. Aw, hell, D... we're always arguing. You're always telling me what a ba--" A glare arises out of habit, and Leon, for once, changes what he was about to say. "--what a bad guy I am. I was just wondering if you really did want me to just... not come back. If you really did hate it when I left Chris there with you. If that was really an inconvenience, if you didn't want--"

D reached for Leon's arm, effectively silencing the Detective. His eyes held a faint sympathy for the babbling man's quandary, his pursed lips and slight smile bespeaking his own concerns.

"Detective, I do not hate you, if that is what you are asking. Perhaps I should. You are crude and loud, and your apartment disgusts and offends my sensibilities beyond simple words."

Leon opened his mouth, rage already overboiling. D placed a finger upon his lips, knowing that nothing else would stop the outburst.

"However."

The air between them seemed to shimmer with that one word.

"For all that I should hate you... I do not."

And here, Leon had to take a moment to remember how to breathe, because D smiled at him a real smile, a true smile, a _happy_ smile. He couldn't think too clearly at that moment, but he thought it might have been the most beautiful thing he'd ever seen.

The way his eyes were... and his hair was... and his lips, and the hint of his teeth, and his skin, and the way the sun... and the way the wind... and the way that _D_... the way that D was D.

"Oh..." Leon managed after a minute or so, when his brain managed to relocate its logic circuits. "Oh. Uh. Good. That's, uh, that's good, I guess."

Silence hovered over the small craft as it drifted in the current, nudge occasionally by the pod of dolphins that seemed intent on guarding it.

Eventually, it began to get dark.

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Do me a favour and review? I still can't get these guys quite right. 


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